


no time left to borrow

by shineonloki



Series: 100 Lifetimes Challenge [6]
Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Blood, Don't Have to Know Canon SPN, Human AU, M/M, Supernatural AU - Freeform, mild violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-29
Updated: 2018-11-29
Packaged: 2019-09-02 01:52:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16777252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shineonloki/pseuds/shineonloki
Summary: The day his mother brought the bundle of crying, pudgy baby home, Loki had been his to protect.It was his job to protect him from the pain and grief of their mother’s death, of the drunken fits of their father, the nomadic life on the road, and the things that went bump in the night.Well, they both had a handle on that last one.





	no time left to borrow

**Author's Note:**

> i can't believe it took this long for me to write an spn au. this is one i'll probably elaborate on later.  
> and because you can't have a spn au without classic rock, all lyrics in the breaks are from  
> [doolin' dalton/desperado reprise by the eagles. ](https://genius.com/Eagles-doolin-dalton-desperado-reprise-lyrics)

Loki reached over and clicked off the radio, which was a shame because _Ramblin’ Man_ had just come on. When Thor tried to turn it back on, his brother slapped his hand away.

“Let’s just have some peace and quiet. How does that sound?”

“When was the last time our lives allowed peace and quiet?” Thor asked, looking over to Loki who was snuggling himself into the faded leather seat, head pillowed against the glass window.

Loki yawned, crossed his arms over his chest and closed his eyes. “Exactly.”

——

_Well, the stage was set the sun was sinkin' low down.  
As they came to town to face another showdown._

——

Loki was always there, since before Thor could remember. He knew there must have been a time when that wasn’t the case, seeing that he was four years older, but he couldn’t recall.

The day his mother brought the bundle of crying, pudgy baby home, Loki had been his to protect.

It was his job to protect him from the pain and grief of their mother’s death, of the drunken fits of their father, the nomadic life on the road, and the things that went bump in the night.

Well, they both had a handle on that last one.

The vampire stood in front of Thor snarling, right up until an axe swung from behind him. The head rolled off with a thud and the body dropped limp and lifeless, to reveal Loki standing, heaving and blood-splattered, with a manic grin stretched on his face.

“A stake to the heart is a lot less messy,” Thor sighed.

“But beheading is so much more fun.”

Thor kicked the vampire’s head, face still frozen in the menacing growl. It rolled until it hit Loki’s boot, and he blinked down at it with a sour expression before kicking it back.

“Don’t be a child,” Loki sniffed, prim and proper— which he was not. Still, Thor could see the hint of a smile as he wiped the blood from the axe blade.

——

They got lucky with the vampire nest, it had been a much-needed case in a what was, otherwise, a dry spell. The network of hunters remained silent, as they drove from shitty town to shitty town looking for a monster to stab, gut, or shoot.

It wasn’t a glamorous life, but it was theirs. Sometimes Thor worried Loki wished for something more, something normal.

Normal wasn’t something Thor could offer Loki.

But Loki would toss himself down on whatever grimy hotel mattress they found, arms and legs spread like he was laying on goose-down. He would turn his head in Thor’s direction, black hair fanned out across the pillow, and smile.

And Thor would know Loki wasn’t asking for normal.

——

The salty taste of ocean air was on his tongue, the wind blowing softly inland. It was calm, relaxing—the sound of waves washing the shore, and gulls calling in the sky. The porch of the cottage was facing the water, and Thor sat on the steps to bask in the morning sun.

It was a dream.

He knew this because Loki was suddenly in his lap, moving up and down, kissing him sweetly. Thor’s hands were on him in an instant, searching and pulling him closer. Loki broke the kiss, smiled, and pushed him back.

Instead of hitting the wooden deck, his head landed against a soft pillow, and they were in a bed of white linen, rolling together.

——

Thor always dreamt of Loki, since they were both children.

Despite the horrors they faced in their waking life, Thor never had nightmares. Only happy dreams, where his brother was there. He wasn’t sure when they turned less innocent. It was a secret he would gladly take to his grave if only it meant more nights spent in and with each other.

“Did you hear me?”

Thor turned to Loki in the passenger seat. He was wearing one of Thor’s old flannels, the orange and brown one that he claimed he hated. His eyes were trained on the steering wheel, where Thor was gripping it so hard his knuckles were turning white.

“No, yeah, what was that?”

Even though Thor was already back to paying attention to the expanse of asphalt before them, he could practically hear Loki’s eye-roll.

“I _said_ Stark messaged that there was a case about twenty miles from here.”

That’s what Thor needed, something to get his hands dirty. The adrenaline of the hunt.

“He say what it was?”

Thor caught a glimpse of Loki frowning down at his phone. “Sounds like a wraith,” he said with a shudder.

Wraiths, nasty things that fed on brain fluid from their own personal wrist straw. That meant there was probably a trail of victims with empty heads.

“Better than nothing.”

——

The hunt led them to a little town in the middle of the desert. The Arizona heat had Thor picking at the collar of his fed suit. Loki, on the other hand, didn’t break a sweat in his all-black three-piece. He hated when he wore it— he looked so sleek and handsome, manicured and high-end with his hair pulled back into a low bun. Out of reach, out of place, like Loki belonged somewhere else.

Anywhere but with him.

Thor watched him shake the deputy’s hand and walk away scribbling something in a notepad.

“Well?”

Loki pressed the address into his palm.

“All the victims are senior citizens.”

In his hand, the yellow legal paper read _Valhalla Retirement Center_ in Loki’s loopy cursive. Thor raised an eyebrow and Loki mirrored it.

“So, we got a wraith using grandma and grandpa as their own personal juice bar?”

“Seems like it,” Loki stated flatly, unimpressed with Thor’s flowery description.

“We got silver?”

——

The job should have been simple.

Finding the wraith was easy enough. Disguised as two loving brothers coming from out of town to visit their grandmother, finding an old woman to mistake them as her grandsons was also easy. Loki had walked the halls, nonchalantly checking a compact mirror for the reflection of something grotesque.

The wraith was a male orderly who they followed to an abandoned wing.

The second Thor noticed Loki’s expression change, he slid the silver dagger from its sheath.

The job should have been simple, but the wraith noticed something too.

In an instant, he lunged for Loki, who already had his dagger in hand. Thor watched as Loki swung to plunge the blade deep into his chest, but the wraith was too quick. He hurdled Loki against the wall, and his dagger skidded across the hospital floor.

Thor sprang into action but froze the second the orderly twisted a squirming Loki in his arms, the horn-like needle protruding from his wrist. He pointed the sharp end to Loki’s neck, ending his struggle.

“Put that knife away, or I suck the life right out of your brother.”

With no hesitation, Thor sat his dagger on the ground and kicked it out of the way.

“The Odinson brothers,” the wraith purred. “Do you think I didn’t smell that stench the second you rolled into town?”

Loki had stopped his struggle for the most part, but his breathing was heavy and there was a panic in his eyes as he stared straight at Thor.

“Everyone is afraid of the mighty Thor,” the wraith continued. “But I know he has a weakness.”

His weakness currently had a disgusting needle stuck to the skin of his neck. Fortunately for them both, Thor also had a gun with their last three silver bullets in his back pocket.

Thor held out his hands in a temporary truce.

“Just give him back, and I let you go.”

The wraith snarled, and Loki’s face crumpled in pain as he shoved the needle in further.

“Do you think I’m an idiot? Why would I believe you?”

“You said it yourself, I have a weakness. Just let Loki go,” Thor said with false calmness. Inside, his heart beat like a drum. “These people have one foot in death’s door already, what does it matter?”

He seemed to contemplate this, and Thor could see the cogs turning. Finally, his face smoothed into something resembling understanding, and Loki was being pushed forward, stumbling with his arms outstretched for Thor.

Thor whipped out the handgun from his pocket, aiming over Loki’s shoulder and straight at the wraith’s head. He took the shot, but not before the monster shoved the long spike from its wrist into Loki’s chest, breaking it off as he fell lifelessly to the ground behind him.

Loki gasped, looking down where the sharp end of the spike exited his chest, red spilling out of the wound. He was still standing, hands shaking as his fingers slipped through the blood.

“Thor?”

“Loki,” Thor whispered. The shock wore off, adrenaline took over, and he rushed to his side right as Loki collapsed into his arms. “Loki, its okay, it will be fine.”

It wouldn’t be fine, not with the location of the exit wound. There was no way it didn’t hit something, something big. Loki turned blurry as his eyes filled with tears, and he cradled his baby brother to his chest, petting at his hair, kissing his forehead.

“Thor,” Loki repeated. He sounded scared, but not weak.

Thor leaned back enough to see him, eyes still wide, chest still moving up and down with steady, strong breaths. He watched as Loki grabbed the end of the spike, grimacing as he tugged it and pulled it through, fresh blood leaking from the wound.

He paled, looking up and blinking, worried, looking so much like the little boy Thor had watched grow up.

“What is happening?” He placed a hand to his chest. The wound was gone.

“Thor?” He sounded small, voice trembling.

Thor could only watch in wonder as Loki stood as if nothing ever happened. The dark stain on his chest the only evidence left. Loki stripped himself of his gray shirt, a tiny scar where a gaping exit wound should be.

“What am I?”

Thor pulled himself up, reaching for Loki who drew back and cowered from his touch.

“You’re my brother,” Thor answered. It was the truth, he had raised Loki. Made sure he was fed, made sure he was bathed, tucked him into dirty hotel beds while their father drank himself into a stupor.

Thor was Loki’s brother by right, if not blood.

“What more than that?” Loki asked through gritted teeth. “What more?”

This time Loki let Thor take his hand, though the scowl on his face remained. Seething, blinding anger. Loki was smart, in every sense, but he never let himself see the truth. And, if Thor never told him— did that make him a liar?

“You were only a baby,” Thor started, and Loki jerked his hand back.

Hurt, betrayal.

“Mom and dad, they—” Thor struggled for the words. The truth had been buried for so long, he had sworn he would never let it surface. It was done in good faith, he wanted to protect Loki. That was all he ever wanted.

“They _what_?”

Thor closed his eyes and tried to remember the night his father pulled him to the side under the awning while Loki splashed and played in the rain. Thor had asked him why he hated Loki, why he always treated him different.

And, Odin said it, flat out: _Loki is not your brother._

He didn’t elaborate until years later, in a rare moment of clear sobriety. Weeks before he died.

“There was a nest of Djinn, they got them but,” Thor swallowed, looked away from the devastation on his brother’s face. “There was a baby.”

Loki’s mouth hung open in a silent cry, his eyes watering red. Just like that, whatever illusion or glamour he had unknowingly cast on himself vanished. Swirling, black lines traced his normally pristine, pale face. They patterned his skin like intricate tattoos, an inheritance of his true nature. Djinn markings.

“A Djinn,” Loki spat, disdain dripping. “I am just another monster we hunt.”

Those words were a blade through Thor’s heart, he ached. Never did he want Loki to feel as though he was a monster— but as he watched his brother examine his own marked flesh, green eyes glowing blue, he had to remember that he wasn’t human.

Next, Thor watched as what that meant clicked into place. Djinn, who feed of the fantasies of others in their dreams. Their deepest desires— Thor’s deepest desire.

All those nights spent kissing and cuddling. All those nights spent panting and fucking. Thor watched as each one passed through Loki’s memory.

“I didn’t want you to find out this way,” Thor said quietly. His fingers twitched at his side. True form or note— he wanted to hold his brother, to comfort him.

“No,” Loki hissed, it was cruel and mocking. “You didn’t want me to find out at all. You just wanted to keep me like a whore for you to use every night while I knew nothing of who I was, or what I am!”

Loki’s chest heaved with anger, his fingers curled into claws poised to strike. He hadn’t thought his actions so selfish, but Loki certainly did. There were no excuses, no explanations for this terrible situation fate and their parents had set for them. It didn’t matter anyway, Loki was beyond reason and justifiably so.

“I’m sorry,” Thor tried.

Loki laughed, but it was devoid of humor or humanity. He smiled, a broken chasm cracked on his face. “No, you aren’t.”

Thor watched defeated as Loki turned and stepped over the wraith’s corpse. The black lines on his skin began to fade into his normal peachy tone until he looked just as he always had. He snatched up his bloodstained shirt, pulling it over his head as he walked toward the exit of the abandoned corridor.

“Loki,” Thor called out.

Loki ignored him.

“Brother!”

This made him freeze rigid in his tracks, but he didn’t look back. Didn’t say or do anything but walk away, leaving only a monster and the dead body of a wraith.

——

 _Your twisted fate has found you out,_  
_and it's finally turned the tables._  
_Stole your dreams and paid you with regret._

——

According to the hunter’s circuit, Loki was dead.

There was a gathering where they all lit a corpseless pyre and stood drinking bitter whiskey while the flames whipped and flickered into the night.

They all pitched in to rent Thor a cabin to mourn in, patted his back and mumbled apologies— though Thor doubted any really cared. Loki had always been a pain in their ass.

——

Two months later, he got an e-mail from Stark. A possible djinn case.

Thor printed out the article and reread it again. Three deaths; it was unlikely to be Loki, but worth looking into. He push-pinned it into his corkboard, decorated with other articles, newspaper clippings, and blurry photos taken with security cameras of men with curly, black hair.

He took a step back, looking at his compiled evidence, feeling only a little proud.

This would all come down, of course, when Thor found him. He had to admit it was a bit of an eyesore in his new house— which already wasn’t much to look at. But the rent was cheap, and it had a front porch, two bedrooms, and would be fine if it meant retirement from life as a hunter.

No matter how many throw pillows or paintings he hung, the house still felt empty. It missed that key component to make it a home.

_Loki._

Thor would find him, fight for his forgiveness, and give him the apple-pie, domestic life they had both been dreaming of.

——

 _Ain't it hard when you're all alone in the center ring?_   
_Now there's no time left to borrow_   
_Is there gonna’ be anything left? Only stardust._   
_Maybe tomorrow, maybe tomorrow, maybe tomorrow._


End file.
